Chupacabras, green cards and piñatas, oh my

More people are getting on the anti-Arizona SB 1070 bandwagon, including T-shirt vendors who started responding to former Major Leaguer Mike Bacsik’s “dirty Mexican” comments and are now producing tees that address Arizona’s racial-profiling law.

Tonight the Phoenix Suns will wear their “Los Suns” jerseys in honor of Cinco de Mayo and as a protest against SB 1070. San Antonio rock band The Krayolas‘ newest song addresses the law, too. Lead singer Hector Saldana writes for the San Antonio Express-News.

Signed by Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer, it empowers police to ask people they suspect of being in the country illegally for their papers. Civil rights groups have protested, calling it racial profiling and unconstitutional. Court challenges are being prepared, even as polls show a majority of Arizonans support the law.

“We felt we had to express our views about SB 1070,” Sanchez says. “This law targets one group of people, it’s truly a racist law.”

It also makes illegal immigration a state crime in Arizona, even though under federal immigration laws, such as they are, it is a civil offense and enforced soley by federal authorities. So in Arizona law, a person who can’t produce documents (who aren’t carrying their passports or birth certificates, for example) may be criminally prosecuted, jailed and handed over for deportation.

Activists responded last Saturday with protests in more than 70 cities. Groups planning conventions in Arizona are cancelling them, and entertainers and others have expressed their dismay and outrage over the law.

Message tees are responding, too. One says “100% Dirty Mexican,” a message that both protests and laughs at the Twitter comment that got a Dallas radio personality fired.

Siesta Tees, a Hispanic themed apparel company, isn’t new to slogan-making. Its humorous line includes “Make Tacos, Not War!,” “Powered by Brown Energy” and “My Chupacabra Will Eat Your Pit Bull!” Sanchez now offers more than 50, including “Stop the Violence, Hit a Piñata,” “I Think the Chupacabra is Under My Bed” and “Don’t Make Me Use My Chancla!”